Pausing Judgement

Hello, and welcome to lesson five of mindful eating. Today, we're going to be talking about the thoughts we have around food and eating. When choosing what to eat, have you ever noticed that little voice inside your head that says you can't eat that, it has too many calories, or chocolate is bad, kale is good. This voice is what we call the judging mind. When mindfully eating, it's important that we don't use labels like good or bad. And just as we try not to put food into good or bad categories, we also resist judging ourselves as good or bad for having eaten certain foods. The judging mind may try to forbid us from eating certain things. But as we know, when we deny ourselves something, we end up wanting it even more. Then we often end up overeating it, because we promise ourselves this is the last time we're ever going to have it. So along with the helping of a delicious treat, we also get a serving of guilt. And it's this guilt that can lead to emotional overeating, and start the cycle all over again. It's exhausting, isn't it? Instead, when mindfully eating, we allow ourselves to enjoy the food we really want. We listen to what the body wants and needs, and also tune in to what the senses will enjoy. So instead of restricting our ourselves, we can monitor the amount of food we eat based on listening to cues from our own bodies....